Jessica Ralston's Blog

I have to, have to, have to, have to post in this every day. I should set an alarm on my computer or on my phone or something.

Some things have happened since I last posted (in November 2010). Here is a list:

• I moved to Northeast China in February to teach English to adorable little Chinese kids. It’s a fun job, I like it a lot. But I miss Western conveniences, Western politeness, and my family and friends. ‘Nuff said. I’ll be back in New York in February 2012.
• It snowed for 97 hours straight in December in the city where I live in New York. Ridiculous, I know.
• The super-duper folks who run National Novel Writing Month decided it would be fun to do summer sessions and call it Camp NaNoWriMo. I attempted the July session and failed utterly (I was on holiday and my work schedule got busy), but we’re in the middle of the August session and I am kicking ass and taking names.
• Events I’ve missed since I moved to China in no order: two funerals, the birth of my second cousin, the marriage of my other second cousin, my baby sister’s junior prom, seeing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II at midnight with my best friend, two family reunions, and a few concerts. Suck.
• Totally awesome things I’ve done since moving to China, which sort of make up for the things I’ve missed at home: traveled to Beijing, walked through the Forbidden City, saluted a Mao statue mockingly (which I took great pleasure in), went to a music festival featuring Chinese punk and indie and electro bands, flew to Thailand, went snorkeling over Thai reefs and saw a number of things I don’t know the name of, jumped off a 15-feet tall dive boat into the ocean, danced on a stripper pole with a Thai hooker, saw Harry Potter at midnight in a theater full of Chinese HP fans.

So anyway, I’ve been pretty busy lately. I’m about 5,000 words ahead of where I should be on my Camp NaNo novel, and that’s where I like to be. It makes me feel like I have a comfortable buffer zone if anything should happen, and I can’t write for a day or two. I fee like I can squeeze out another couple hundred words before sleep.

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